Barthé received numerous awards for his sculpture, including the Rosenwald Fellowship and the Guggenheim Fellowship. Considered by critics to be one of the leading “moderns” of his time, Barthé’s sculpture bridges the gap between realism and abstraction. His figures fit within the Realist tradition, but their elongated and sometimes distorted forms lend an Expressionist quality. He was the one of first sculptors to feature blacks as one of the main subjects. In 1929, Barthé relocated to New York, where he established a studio in Harlem. Immersing himself in the cultural renaissance flourishing there, Barthé developed a reputation among scholars of the New Negro Movement, including Alain Locke, who became a passionate collector and promoter of his work, as well as Langston Hughes.